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AS THE SUN SANK, THE WOODS WERE 
LIGHTED WITH THE MOST BEAUTIFUL 
COLORS. PAGE 44. 












THE ROUND-TOP BOOKS 


THE BUSY BEAVERS 


OF 

ROUND-TOP 


By 

ELLEN D. WANGNER 

Author of “Bobby Lynx of Round-Toff 
“Mother Fox of Round-Toff etc . 



ILLUSTRATIONS BY 

HENRY WANGNER 


NEW YORK 

THE NOURSE COMPANY 

PUBLISHERS 



Copyright, 1921, 

BY 

THE NOURSE COMPANY 


AUG -8'21 


©CU622353 


CONTENTS 


I. Two Little Strangers Come to 

Round-Top .... 9 

II. The Beavers Finish the Dam . 22 

III. In Which Mother Beaver Has 

an Accident .... 34 

IV. Father Beaver’s Adventure . 53 

V. New Citizens in Beaver Town . 71 

VI. Little Brother Meets Some 

Enemies .85 

VII. Mr. Otter Goes Sliding . . 98 

VIII. The Forest Fire .... 110 



\ 


ILLUSTRATIONS 

PAGE 

Aa the sun sank, the woods were 
lighted with the most beautiful 
colors. Frontispiece 

The outer and lower side of the dam was a 

tangle of sticks.22 

The first part of a beaver’s house looks like 
a hollow pile of sticks with mud over 
them ....... 36 

Having such a good time that Mother 

Beaver did not like to take them home 82 

The Otter was sliding down the snowy, icy 

mound.106 



The Busy Beavers of 
Round-Top 

CHAPTER I 

TWO LITTLE STRANGERS COME TO 
ROUND-TOP 

It was summertime on Round-Top 
Hill and all the little forest-people were 

as busy as they could be! Mother Lynx 

/ 

and Grandmother Black-Bear and Mol- 
lie Rabbit and the foxes and the wood¬ 
chucks and porcupines were hard at 
work training their families, playing and 
frolicking on the friendly mountain that 
was so big that it gave them all a home 
and a big playground as well. 

Down at the foot of the Hill were the 

9 


10 THE BUSY BEAVERS OP ROUND-TOP 


marshes, filled with hundreds of young 
frog children, and Long Pond glimmered 
and glistened in the bright summer sun¬ 
shine as if it were laughing over some 
precious secret. And that is exactly 
what it was doing, for a new family had 
just moved into the end of the Pond 
where a stream came bubbling and tum¬ 
bling down the mountainside. 

Long Pond was very shallow here. In 
fact, it was scarcely more than a marsh in 
the summertime. On the flat ground be¬ 
tween the Pond and the Hill, the young 
birch trees and poplars and maples were 
growing larger and larger each year un¬ 
til they looked as if they were an army 
marching on the Pond to drive it right 
away from the Hill. The young trees, 
with their long, lacy roots, would soon 
make a woodland out of the marshy end 
of the Pond! 

But that morning, two furry little 



TWO LITTLE STRANGERS 


11 


strangers had suddenly appeared at this 
identical spot. Where they had come 
from, the Pond did not know. But it was 
very glad to see them. Now this tree- 
army would be sent flying, for the two 
little strangers were a pair of beavers that 
had come to start a new Beaver-Town at 
the foot of Round-Top. And well did 
Long Pond know what would happen to 
those birch and beech and poplar trees 
and the saucy alder bushes along the 
banks of the stream! 

So the Pond rippled and smiled and it 
didn’t tell the secret even to the summer 
wind. The wind was very lazy that day, 
—he wasn’t blowing at all and so he did 
not learn the Pond’s secret and could not 
tell it to the other forest-folk on Round- 
Top. It was a secret that Mother Fox 
and Mrs. Lynx and Grandfather Black- 
Bear would have liked very much to 
know, for, if there be one thing that 



12 THE BUSY BEAVERS OF ROUND-TOP 


Mother Lynx and these other folk 
like to have for breakfast, it is a nice, fat 
beaver! 

But no one knew about them, so they 
waddled busily about, trying to decide 
just exactly where to locate their town 
and build their dam. And at last they 
found it. The stream broadened out on 
the flat, marshy plain and rippled in and 
around some big rocks that the frost had 
sent rolling down the mountain. So far 
had they rolled and bumped and bounced 
down the hillside that they had landed 
quite a distance out on the plain. And 
there they were, right in the midst of the 
birch thicket. 

The beavers were very much excited 
as they saw this spot, for here was flat 
land where their dam would make the 
waters spread out until it surrounded all 
the little trees,—just the food they 
wanted for winter! Oh, it was a beauti- 



TWO LITTLE STRANGERS 


13 


ful spot and exactly right for a Beaver- 
Town! The big rocks would help to hold 
the dam and the little trees would furnish 
them with all the bark and tender buds 
they needed for food. 

It was indeed a fine place to start a new 
town and Mr. and Mrs. Beaver stood up 
on their short hind legs and thumped the 
earth ker-whack with their tails, which 
was their way of showing how pleased 
and excited they were. 

Now the beavers, although they have 
such beautiful fur, are far from being 
beautiful animals,—that is, when they are 
out of the water. And Mr. and Mrs. 
Beaver looked very odd as they stood de¬ 
ciding about the place where they were 
going to build their new home. They 
were so very much alike that you could 
not tell them apart. Each was about two 
feet long,—not counting their tails,— 
each weighed about thirty-five pounds. 



14 THE BUSY BEAVERS OF ROUND-TOP 


each was clumsy and fat and covered with 
thick, soft, creamy-looking fur so close to 
their bodies that it was like a fleece, with 
a top fur of long, glistening brown hairs. 
Their coats were very beautiful and each 
coat was water-proof so that they could 
stay in the water all they wished to with¬ 
out getting a bit wet! Which was a very 
fine thing for Mr. and Mrs. Beaver, as 
they spent so much of their time in the 
water! 

Now Mr. and Mrs. Beaver were dis¬ 
tant cousins of the squirrel family, and in 
their faces they looked very much like 
huge squirrels, with small, light-brown 
eyes, and small, round ears covered with 
fur. But their teeth were not like Mrs. 
Gray-Squirrel’s at all! For both Mr. and 
Mrs. Beaver had long, orange-colored 
front teeth that looked like yellow chisels 
sticking out from their lips. 

But their tails were the most peculiar 



TWO LITTLE STE ANGERS 


15 


part of these queer little animals. They 
were not one bit like the fluffy, plumy 
tail of Mother Gray-Squirrel. They 
were flat, stiff, paddle-shaped affairs 
about a foot long and covered with a 
shiny, blackish-gray, horny skin that 
looked like scales! No other animal in 
the world has a tail like a beaver! And 
no one knows quite all the uses he makes 
of this tail, either. When frightened, he 
gives the water a loud slap with it that 
sends the alarm to all his family and the 
whole town. When swimming, his tail 
acts as a rudder. And now, as Mr. and 
Mrs. Beaver talked about their beautiful 
new home, they displayed another use for 
their tails, for they half-sat down on the 
grassy bank, using their stiff tails to prop 
them up. 

The back feet of the beavers were 
webbed like those of a duck, but their lit¬ 
tle forefeet were exactly like a squirrel’s. 



16 THE BUSY BEAVERS OF ROUND-TOP 


They looked almost like little hands and 
as Mrs. Beaver bit off a small, delicious 
birch twig near her and held it up in her 
little paws to nibble, she looked like a 
dainty little old lady dressed all in fur. 

But the beavers did not sit on the bank 
very long. There was such a lot of work 
to be done that Mrs. Beaver soon threw 
her birch twig away and she and Father 
Beaver waded and waddled out to the 
centre of the stream, as if to see just what 
ought to be done first. And Father 
Beaver did not take a very long time to 

decide. A dam must be built as soon as 

• 

possible! Even before a home was built! 

The little stream was so low that the 
marsh was already beginning to dry up, 
and as the front door of a beaver’s house 
must be covered with water at all times, 
Father Beaver knew that it would be use¬ 
less to dig a burrow or build a house, as 
all the foxes and the wolves on Round- 



TWO LITTLE STBANGEES 


17 


Top would see their front door and know 
exactly where he and Mother Beaver 
could be found for breakfast or a nice 
supper! No, indeed! That could never 
be! That stream must be made both to 
spread out and grow deeper at once and a 
dam was the means of making it do that! 

Now both Mr. and Mrs. Beaver knew 
that they were running a great risk if 
they worked in the daytime, but,—oh, 
dear! There was so much to be done, and 
besides, it was so hot and the sun so 
bright, probably all the other animals 
would be asleep getting ready for their 
hunting trips at night. So they just de¬ 
cided to get to work at once, hoping that 
Mother Fox and Grandfather Black- 
Bear would not see them! 

Mr. and Mrs. Beaver did not need to 
tell each other what to do! Each went 
right to work without a word, for each of 
them had been a very capable worker in 



18 THE BUSY BEATERS OF ROUND-TOP 


the little Beaver-Town in which they had 
grown up. Gnawing down some alder 
bushes, both Mr. and Mrs. Beaver floated 
and guided them to the spot in the stream 
where they were going to begin work. 
They did not begin to build their dam at 
the banks of the stream. Oh no, indeed! 
They began exactly in the centre, where 
the current was strongest and would float 
the bushes out in the exact direction that 
the dam must take if it were to stand the 
pressure of the water when the Pond 
grew full. Just how the beaver knows 
that he must let the current tell him how 
to shape his dam so that it will hold, is one 
of Mother Nature’s secrets. 

Both Mr. and Mrs. Beaver knew this 
secret very well, however, and so they 
floated the alder bushes down to the spot 
where they wanted the dam and the 
laughing, rippling stream thought it lots 
of fun to straighten these bushes out with 



TWO LITTLE STRANGERS 


19 


their brushy ends down stream. But 
they did not float away, although the 
stream tried hard to make them. It 
pulled at them and flowed through their 
leaves and danced and sang about them 
until the little bushes just longed to dance 
away with it. But there was work for 
these alder bushes to do and Mr. and Mrs. 
Beaver meant to see that they did it! 

Before the little stream could pull the 
bushes away, the beavers forced them to 
the bottom and made them lie there by 
heaping mud and stones on them! Oh, 
how hard Father and Mother Beaver 
worked, scooping the stones up with their 
“ hands ” and piling them quickly on the 
bushes! Sometimes they waded clear 
over to the banks for some especially 
large stones, rolling and pushing some so 
large that it seemed impossible for these 
little animals to move them. 

After fastening down a number of the 



20 THE BUSY BEAVERS OF ROUND-TOP 


alder bushes so that they could not get 
away, they quickly cut down some sap¬ 
lings with their yellow teeth-chisels, and 
these were laid over the bushes with more 
mud and stones and grass and moss 
placed on top. And now the little stream 
began to help more, although it did not 
know that it was helping. As the dam 
began to spread, the water worked harder 
and harder to press through, but this 
pressure of the water only managed to 
drive the moss and earth more tightly in 
among the alder bushes. 

By this time the beavers were veiy 
tired, so they bit off some tender birch 
twigs and had a delicious supper. The 
sun dropped behind old Round-Top and 
a whippoorwill flew down close beside the 
dam. Then Night began to fold up in 
her soft, black coat, the hill and all the 
little forest-people, and the whippoorwill 
called out its queer little song :—“ Purple 



TWO LITTLE STRANGERS 


21 


1 — whip — purple — whip—whip — poor — 
will ” When, like a piece of black tissue- 
paper, he fluttered away, the beavers 
went back to work. 




CHAPTER II 


THE BEAVERS FINISH THE DAM 

When morning came, the little stream 
seemed to sound very cross. He did not 
quite know whether he liked this tight belt 
that the beavers were tying right across 
him, and he made quite a fuss as he 
swirled and whirled around the ends of 
the dam that were coming closer and 
closer to the shore! By this time, the in¬ 
ner surface of the dam looked quite like a 
smooth bank of earth, while the outer and 
lower side was a tangle of sticks and small 
logs that poked up very much like an 
orderly brush pile. 

The little stream, grown deeper now, 
hurled itself at this new girdle that it was 

being forced to wear, but it did no good. 

22 



THE OUTER AND LOWER SIDE OF THE DAM 
WAS A TANGLE OF STICKS. PAGE 22. 
















THE BEAVERS FINISH THE DAM 23 


The dam held very well and all that the 
stream could do was to find little holes in 
the moss and earth and sticks through 
which it could work its way. As soon as 
a little hole was discovered, the mis¬ 
chievous water hurried through it as fast 
as it could, carrying off some bits of earth 
here and a leaf or stick there. 

Then either Mr. or Mrs. Beaver would 
swim over with fresh material to stop this 
leak, and thus it became a game between 
the beavers and the stream. When the 
stream found every part of the face of the 
dam so solid that it could not get through, 
off it would dash to the ends of the dam, 
ripping off twigs and grass and leaves 
and running away with them to Long 
Pond where they bobbed around in the 
sunshine. 

The beavers were very - tired. They 
had worked all night and they would have 
liked very much to go to a nice beaver 



24 THE BUSY BEAVERS OF ROUND-TOP 


house and sleep. But no beaver home 
was ready for them, so they stole off to a 
big beech tree that had had most of the 
earth washed away from around its roots 
in a spring flood, and there they curled up 
for a nap after digging a shallow burrow 
in the bank close by the roots. If Mother 
Lynx or Mrs. Fox had been hunting that 
way that morning, or if an otter had come 
up from the lower end of Long Pond, the 
beavers’ dam would never have been fin¬ 
ished! But no enemy came to disturb 
them, and as the evening shadows once 
more crept out over the Pond, Mr. and 
Mrs. Beaver rushed eagerly back to work. 

And the first task that night ought to 
have been to dig a burrow or build a 
house, but Father Beaver found a muddy 
bank where he and Mother Beaver dug 
out a small burrow that would answer 
very well until they got the dam built and 
could take time to make both a real house 



THE BEAVERS FINISH THE DAM 25 


and a burrow. Then they rushed to work 
on the dam, and by the time that morning 
came once more, the dam had grown to 
look very much like a huge measuring- 
worm stretched across the stream. 

One end of the dam had reached one of 
the big rocks, and here both Mr. and Mrs. 
Beaver worked as hard as they could, 
carrying good-sized logs and sticks down 
the stream to be piled up against the rock. 
Mud and grass and roots were plastered 
securely in all the spaces, and little by lit¬ 
tle the stream was forced back until it 
began to spread out and out. First one 
little birch tree and then another and an¬ 
other began to find its roots getting wet¬ 
ter and wetter! Back the waters spread, 
right up to the hill itself in some places, 
and still the dam grew and grew. 

The ground was so flat that the dam had 
to be very long to keep the stream from 
spreading out until it could run away 



26 THE BUSY BEAVERS OF ROUND-TOP 


around the ends of the dam. Oh, how 
Mr. and Mrs. Beaver worked! All night 
long!—and sometimes, when it was a 
dark, rainy day, they worked daytimes, 
too! Poor Mrs. Beaver felt her jaws ach¬ 
ing so hard some mornings that she could 
hardly eat her breakfast! 

But she felt repaid for even such tired 
jaws and sore teeth when she looked at 
the beautiful dam that she and Father 
Beaver had made! Its top was quite level 
and the water trickled over it very evenly 
along its whole length. This w^as the sure 
test of a well-built dam, for if they had 
built it so that the water had all spilled 
over in one place, the little stream might 
have grown strong enough in that es¬ 
pecial spot to have washed the dam away! 
For the little stream was little no longer 
now, and it could scold and growl and 
roar in quite an ugly way when it wished 
to! It was about a foot deeper above the 





THE BEAVEKS FINISH THE DAM 27 


dam than it had been, and as it dashed it¬ 
self at one of the big rocks in the dam, it 
seemed to be telling the rock to clear out 
and let it pass; and the stream’s voice 
sounded quite gruff! 

And then, one morning, the little 
stream raced away to Long Pond with 
another secret,—several more beavers had 
appeared and were busy at the dam! 
Thev had been driven out of their own 
town by wolves and bears and had fol¬ 
lowed Father and Mother Beaver to this 
new village. And now they all set to work 
together, for the beavers are the most so- 
cial of all the little forest-people, as they 
not only like to live close beside one an¬ 
other but they all join in working at 
something which is to be of help to every 
one in the little town. 

Soon the dam was carried far across the 
swamp so that it would make a broader 
Pond where a really large town of bea- 




28 THE BUSY BEAVERS OF ROUND-TOP 


vers could find plenty to eat, and where 
there would be room for any number of 
burrows and lodges, as the beavers’ 
houses are called. By this time, the little 
stream did not mind being held back at 
all. In fact, he was quite proud of him¬ 
self, and he spread out farther and 
farther and grew deeper and deeper until 
all that was left of some of the swamp 
w T as a few grassy mounds or islands rising 
above the waters. 

But the stream rvas still fond of play¬ 
ing pranks and every time it got a chance 
to force a hole through the dam, it would 
do so, and then how the beavers worked 
to patch up the hole! All through the 
summer this game kept up, and it was a 
very good thing that Father and Mother 
Beaver had some friends to help them. 
If they had not, the stream might have 
w 7 on in the merry little game it played. 

The summer was passing and there 



THE BEAVERS FINISH THE DAM 29 


was a great deal of work yet to do! Mr. 
and Mrs. Beaver decided that they must 
get to work at once on both their house 
and their burrow,—there was not a mo¬ 
ment to be lost! They had already spent 
too much time on the dam,—too much 
entirely! There was all of the winter 
food to be gathered, canals to be cut to 
some delicious trees at the foot of the hill, 
and the lodge must not only be built, but 
must be plastered with several thick coats 
of mud before winter came. 

Father Beaver was terribly worried be¬ 
cause they had taken so long to build the 
dam, and he and Mother Beaver set ear¬ 
nestly to work at their burrow. Now 
they just could not go to any bank that 
they happened to see and scoop out their 
burrow like a rabbit or a woodchuck could 
do. There were several very important 
facts to be taken into consideration before 
the beavers could start this work. 



30 THE BUSY BEAVERS OF ROUND-TOP 


The first thing to be talked over was 
the location of the bank itself. It must 
be at the edge of the Pond so that the 
front door of the burrow would be down 
under the water, and so far down that 
there would be no danger of Jack Frost 
freezing it shut some cold night. The 
second fact was that it must end up under 
the roots of some tree, or at the foot of 
the hill where the end of it would not be 
seen when they broke through the earth, 
with several little holes to let the air come 
into the burrow. And the third fact to 
be thought about was to have this burrow 
quite close to their lodge where they were 
to live. For, you see, this burrow was to 
be a sort of fort to which they could es¬ 
cape if a bear or a wolf or a man man¬ 
aged to destroy their lodge. Oh, the 
beaver family had many, many things to 
think of, and both Mr. and Mrs. Beaver 
waddled here and there on the land and 



THE BEAVERS FINISH THE DAM 31 


swam busily about in the water trying to 
decide on the very best possible spot! 

Now all the other beavers were doing 
the same thing, and the little stream rip¬ 
pled with laughter as it saw them wad¬ 
dling about so earnestly on its banks! At 
last, Father and Mother Beaver found 
the very spot they had been looking for 
and at once they began to work. They 
could make the farther end of their tun- 
nel come out right among the roots of the 
friendly beech tree that had sheltered 
them when they first came to Long Pond. 
It would take quite a long tunnel to do 
this, one almost twenty feet long, in fact, 
but they were accustomed to very hard 
work and they knew they could manage 
this task, somehow. 

It surely was a difficult thing to do, but 
Father Beaver set about it with a will. 
Diving down under the water, he began 
to scoop out the bank, working as rapidly 



32 THE BUSY BEAVERS OF ROUND-TOP 


as he knew how, and then coining to the 
top for a breath of air while Mother 
Beaver took her turn at shovelling out 
the sand and dirt. Turn and turn about 
they worked all night, and when morning 
came, they had made a very good begin¬ 
ning. Oh, but they were tired and they 
went for a long swim in the Pond and 
rested in the sun on a log that stuck out 
of the water. Very soon they returned 
to their task, for they meant to work all 
day since the work was underground 
where no enemy would be apt to find 
them. 

Resting every once in a while, taking 
many a swim to clean the mud out of 
their fur and taking only a very few naps, 
they pushed on so rapidly that it was not 
long until their upward-slanting burrow 
came out exactly where they wanted it 
to,—right under the roots of the old 
beech. They did not let it open out there 



THE BEAVERS FINISH THE DAM 33 


like the mouth of a tunnel, for, if they 
had, Mother Fox might have caught 
them. They just broke through the earth 
enough to let a little air come in and these 
holes were carefully hidden by the roots 
of the tree. Here, underneath the little 
openings, they scooped out a large room 
where a number of them could safely hide 
in time of danger. 

No engineer could have dug a better 
tunnel with big electric shovels than did 


these furry little fellows with only their 
small paws to use as scoops. And no en¬ 
gineer, no matter how wise he was, could 
have made his tunnel come out more ex¬ 
actly in the desired spot than did these 
little creatures who had to work down in 
the dark where it was hard even to 
breathe! It was, indeed, a wonderful 
piece of work, and Father and Mother 
Beaver had a right to be very proud of 
their skill. 



CHAPTER III 


IN WHICH MOTHER BEAVER HAS AN 

ACCIDENT 

All the other beavers had tunnels built 
by this time, some having dug their bur¬ 
rows before working on the dam at all. 
Others had their houses built and were 
now ready to prepare them for winter. 
Father and Mother Beaver had not taken 
the time to build a house. Father Beaver 
was the oldest and wisest beaver in the 
village and he felt that the whole respon¬ 
sibility of the dam lay on his furry shoul¬ 
ders! And he was not the kind of a citi¬ 
zen to shirk when duty called him. If 
the dam were not built, the waters would 
not keep high during the winter and 

then,—of what use would their houses 

34 


MOTHER BEAVER HAS AN ACCIDENT 35 


and burrows be? None whatever! And 
so the dam was built and it was large and 
solid and strong. Oh, he was a very wise 
old beaver indeed! 

After the burrow was finished, he was 
just a little bit undecided whether to 
build a house or not. Some of the other 
beavers were going to live in their bur¬ 
rows all winter and he was very strongly 
tempted to do the same, and then .build 
his house when spring came. Most of the 
winter’s supply of food was still to be 
brought in and sunk to the bottom of the 
Pond and weighted down by stones, so 
that he and Mother Beaver could get it 
easily in the winter-time. Father Beaver 
thought that this was about all they could 
manage before old King Winter came 
with his silvery soldiers of ice to lock up 
all the ponds and streams. 

But Mother Beaver would not have it 
that way at all! She wanted a house and 



36 THE BUSY BEAVEES OF EOOTD-TOF 


a house she was going to have, even if she 
had to do the work all herself, and she 
swam away to a grassy island in the 
Pond, determined to begin work at once. 
There was only one thing for dear old 
Father Beaver to do, and that was to go 
right after her and help all that he could. 
And that is exactly what he did! 

Now a beaver’s lodge, by the time that 
it is all completed, is just as wonderful as 
his burrow or the dams he builds, but 
when he finishes the first part of it, that 
house looks more like a hollow pile of 
sticks with some mud spattered over them 
than anything else. Mrs. Beaver had se¬ 
lected a very good island for their home. 
It was really solid ground and not just a 
high bit of marsh, so, in just a few mo¬ 
ments she was able to get right to work. 

First she waddled all over the small 
island to be sure that it was large enough 
and to spare for the house. For this 




THE FIRST PART OF A BEAVER’S HOUSE 
LOOKS LIKE A HOLLOW PILE OF 
STICKS WITH MUD OVER THEM. 

PAGE 36. 





MOTHER BEAVER HAS AN ACCIDENT 37 


house of hers was not to be a small one, 
but was to have a big living-room about 
five feet wide, and the walls would be 
about three feet thick on all sides, and 
when finished, the little lodge would look 
very much like the ice houses that the Es¬ 
quimaux build. And so the island had to 
be large enough to keep the waters from 
washing into the little house and to give 
plenty of extra land for the house to grow 
cn, for usually each summer a beaver’s 
house is made larger. 

The floor of the house was to be only a 
few inches above the water, as two hall¬ 
ways, or tunnels, were to be dug from 
the living-room, both opening into the 
Pond so far down under the water that 
Jack Frost could not freeze up the open¬ 
ings. The first thing that Mother and 
Father Beaver did was to begin to tram¬ 
ple down the grass in a circle about six 
feet wide. Pat-pat, pat-pat they went 




38 THE BUST BEAVERS OF ROUND-TOP 


trotting around until all the grass was 

\ 

pounded down into the earth. The earth 
itself was very soft and soon the little 
floor began to look quite like a mud-pie, 
which was exactly what Mother and Fa¬ 
ther Beaver desired, for they were now 
going to bring plenty of little twigs and 
sticks to be pounded down into the top of 
this soft mud until the floor was hard and 
smooth. 

Pat-pat they went stamping around it, 
and it surely does seem as if those trowel¬ 
like tails must have helped as they were 
dragged about over the mud, giving it a 
whack or two if Father or Mother Beaver 
grew excited over their work. Anyway, 
it was not long until the beavers had 
made just the floor they wanted, and then 
they began to build their house. For this, 
they had to gather sticks and good-sized 
logs from the birch thicket and the trees 
at the foot of the hill, for a house that is 



MOTHER BEAYER HAS AN ACCIDENT 39 


to have walls three feet thick must have 
stout, strong timbers to keep them from 
caving in. 

Slowly the circular walls grew above 
the floor, and they were so thickly made 
of stones and logs and earth that the 
largest, strongest bear that ever lived on 
Round-Top would not be able to force 
his sharp claws through them when they 
were finished. Over the outside of the 
house, Mr. and Mrs. Beaver plastered 
thick mud, in and around each log, scoop¬ 
ing this mud out of the Pond and wad* 
dling with it, held in their little paws, as 
fast as they could until they reached the 
house. Only a little bit at one time could 
they carry, and it was surely a very slow 
way of getting the plastering done! 

Inside the house, the living-room was 
beginning to look like a real living-room 
and Mrs. Beaver spent a great deal of her 
time in finishing the inside walls of this 



40 THE BUSY BEAVERS OF ROUND-TOP 


room. Every end of a root or log that 
stuck out into the room was nibbled off 
with her big, yellow teeth, and mud was 
carried in and patted over the sticks until 
the walls were as smooth as walls ought 
to be. The house was nearly finished 
now, but Father Beaver decided that it 
needed a few more heavy logs before it 
was quite ready for its many coats of 
plastered mud, and he swam off to a small 
grove of trees at the foot of the hill. 

To reach these trees, a large canal had 
been dug by all the beavers working to¬ 
gether, so that they could float the heavy 
logs to their homes or to the dam. This 
was a much easier way to move the logs 
about than by rolling them over the 
ground and the canal was dug just as 
straight and true by these small, little 
paws as ever it could have been dug with 
really, truly shovels. 

It was a lovely, late afternoon in Sep- 



MOTHER BEAVER HAS AN ACCIDENT 41 


tember when Father Beaver started off to 
get the logs, his little brown head just 
showing above the water as he hurried 
along. He swam so fast, steering himself 
along with his tail, that a big pie-shaped 
trail in the water was left behind him and 
sent tiny little waves scurrying to the 
shores! 

Father Beaver felt that he had to hurry 
every moment now; there was no time to 
be lost. Jack Frost had already touched 
the tops of some of the tallest trees with 
his paint brush and a yellow leaf floated 
on the Pond just where the canal 
branched off. Now this yellow leaf was 
just as plain for Father Beaver to read 
as your A-B-C’s. It told him that win¬ 
ter was on the wav and that if he and 
Mother Beaver did not wish to starve be¬ 
fore spring, they had heaps and heaps of 
logs to cut and either strip off their bark 
or sink them at the bottom of the Pond. 



42 THE BUSY BEAVERS OF ROUND-TOP 

It told him that Jack Frost would be 
ready almost any night, now, to freeze the 
plastered outer layers of mud as hard as 
stone over the outside of his house. In 
fact, if Father Beaver could have told 
you what that yellow leaf told him, he 
would have put it all in three words,— 
“Hurry! Hurry! Hurry !" 

And so on he swam as hard as ever a 
little beaver could go! No wonder there 
were small waves running along the shore 
as he went up the Pond! To the very end 
of the Big Canal he went, where an espe¬ 
cially large birch tree grew. He planned 
to gnaw this down and then both he and 
Mother Beaver would cut the trunk into 
small logs and float them to the lodge. 
Each log would have to be stripped of its 
bark before he could put it on the house, 
and this bark was then to be stored away 
for food. It was a lovely tree about ten 
inches through its trunk, and Father 



MOTHER BEAVER HAS AN ACCIDENT 43 


Beaver’s eyes gleamed with delight as he 
thought of the quantities of delicious in¬ 
ner bark he would get from this one tree 

alone! 

The top of the birch tree had been 
painted a soft yellow by Jack Frost, and 
as Father Beaver waddled out on the 
grassy bank, again he read its message,— 
“ Hurry> Father Beaver! ” And Father 
Beaver hurried! Walking several times 
around the tree, he looked at it from all 
sides and then, mounting a small mound 
of earth near its roots, he began to cut it 
down. He stood up on his hind legs, brac¬ 
ing himself with his tail so that he would 
not fall over backward, and then, holding 
the trunk tightly with both paws, he 
opened his mouth wide and then, backed 
up by every muscle in his stout, little 
body, he made a bite in the bark of the 
tree! His big, yellow teeth struck far 
into the little birch, making a deep gash. 



44 THE BUSY BEAVERS OF ROUND-TOP 


A second savage nip with the powerful 
teeth cut the gash both deeper and longer, 
and a third and fourth brought out a 
good-sized chip. 

Father Beaver’s lumbering had begun 
in earnest. Nothing would stop him now 
until he had gone round and round the 
tree, biting deeper and deeper until he 
had cut so large a groove that he could 
get his head in. Then, closer and closer 
to the heart of the tree he gnawed, work¬ 
ing always around the tree so that it 
would not fall until he was ready to have 
it. Now most of the work on the little 
lodge had been done at night, but Father 
Beaver was in such a hurry that he felt 
he must work daytimes, too. 

As the sun sank behind Round-Top, 
the little canals and the woods were 
lighted with the most beautiful colors! 
Fink and red and yellow, the rays of the 
setting sun flashed on the treetops and 



MOTHER BEAVER HAS AN ACCIDENT 45 


the deep water in the canal. It was a 
very beautiful picture, indeed. 

Mollie Rabbit came down the Hill and 
hopped out quite close to Father Beaver. 
She knew that he would not harm her and 
so she came very near the little canal. 
Mollie was very fond of the beavers, for 
they always scattered so many small 
twigs and buds on the ground when cut¬ 
ting down the trees that she was sure of 
many a delicious meal. As she hopped 
along, Mother Beaver waddled out of the 
canal onto the grassy banks. She had 
come to see what Father Beaver was do¬ 
ing, and finding that he was too busy 
even to notice her, she set to work, too, 
and in a very short time had cut down a 
slender aspen and had one of its very 
small logs in the canal ready to tow back 
to the lodge. 

Father Beaver was* still busily gnaw¬ 
ing at his tree, stopping every little while 



46 THE BUSY BEAVEES OF EOUKD-TOP 


to pat it with his paws to see just how 
much more he must cut it before it fell. 
Then he would look up at its top to see if 
it were all right and then back he would 
fly to his work of chopping. How the 
chips flew and what big ones he could bite 
off! He wanted the tree to fall down 
along the bank where he could cut it up 
into short logs to float home. He was 
just gnawing a last chip out of its heart 
and Mother Beaver was just ready to 
slide down into the water to float her 
small log home when there was a sharp 
crack, a whish-swish-sh through the air 
that sent Mollie Rabbit flying madly 
back toward the Hill,—and down came 
the tree! 

It had fallen just a moment sooner 
than either Father or Mother Beaver had 
expected! Father Beaver jumped back¬ 
ward so quickly that he fell over and 
rolled down a little bank right into the 



MOTHER BEAVER HAS AN ACCIDENT 47 


birch thicket. He was not hurt at all 
but,—oh! what had happened to Mother 
Beaver! There she lay, close by the edge 
of the canal, pinned down to the ground 
by a large branch of the tree! 

Father Beaver waddled over to her as 
quickly as he could. With his tiny little 
“ hands ” he caught hold of her and tried 
to pull her out from under the tree. This 
was something that even strong Father 
Beaver could not do! He could not just 
understand what was the matter with 
Mother Beaver! She did not move nor 
look up, so he patted her very gently with 
his paws; then he poked her several times, 
and then, all at once, he seemed to know 
just what to do! 

If he left her under the branch until he 
could cut it up, a wolf or a fox would 
surely come and catch them both! No, 
indeed,—he could not take time for that! 
Waddling up and down the bank several 



\ . I 

48 THE BUSY BEAYEB8 OP BOUND-TOP 

times, crawling over and under the fallen 
tree, he suddenly slid into the water and, 
turning about, began to dig as fast as ever 
he could, right under Mother Beaver. 

The dirt fairly flew as he scooped it 
out. Some of it came right in his bright, 
little eyes, but he just ducked down under 
the water for a moment and washed it off 
and then began to dig once more. Two 
other beavers had come slowly up the 
canal ready to begin their work of getting 
bark for their own little house, and, see¬ 
ing Father Beaver digging, they helped 
him, taking his place when his little paws 
seemed too tired to scoop out another 
pawful! 

Now, whether Father Beaver told them 
of Mother Beaver’s danger and asked 
their help or whether they merely thought 
that he was digging a new canal and that 
they ought to help, no one knows but 
Mother Nature. Only she knows how 



MOTHER BEAVER HAS AN ACCIDENT 49 


animals talk and it is a secret that she in¬ 
tends to keep to herself. And so she will 
not tell us whether these little animals 
realized exactly what was to be done, or 
whether they knew that they must hurry 
if they would help Mother Beaver. All 
we do know is that they dug with all their 
might! 

The sun had sunk down behind Round- 
Top long ago and the woods and the 
Pond and the Big Canal were all dark 
and shadowy. Up on the mountain, 
Mother Fox and her small cubs were just 
coming out of their cave-house to play on 
the hillside, and Bobbv and Tommy 
Lynx were playing in the tangled thicket 
just outside their Hollow Tree House, 
while Mother Lynx had gone to get their 
supper. All the little rabbits were frisk¬ 
ing about on the hillside and Mrs. Wood¬ 
chuck was sniffing the frosty air. It 
would soon be time for her to go to sleep 



50 THE BUSY BEAVERS OF ROUND-TOP 


for the winter and she sniffled and snuffled 
now to see if she could learn just how 
soon old winter was coining. All the lit¬ 
tle animals were getting ready to frolic 
and hunt on the mountain after their 
day’s rest, and Father Beaver knew that 
at any moment, some one of their many 
enemies might spring at them in the vel¬ 
vety darkness. 

Slowly but surely the ground under 
Mother Beaver was scooped out, and 
very slowly her brown, furry body began 
to slide limply into the cool waters of the 
canal. Almost as the friendly water 
touched her and the cruel, heavv branch 
no longer weighed her down, her soft, 
brown eyes flew open and she gasped two 
or three times for air. Father Beaver 
was in the water, so that when she slid 
down into the canal he could help her, and 
the two other beavers were still busily 
digging at the bank. So busily had they 



MOTHER BEA YER HAS AN ACCIDENT 51 


worked to free Mrs. Beaver that, for a 
moment, they had forgotten all about 
themselves, and, just as Mother Beaver 
slid down into the water, there came a 
slight click! in the woods behind them. 
It was a twig that had broken under the 
foot of some animal! 

For just one instant the frightened little 
beavers sat upright on the bank and then 
they dived into the water just as a big, 
gray, furry animal leaped on to the very 
spot where they had been! It was Mother 
Lynx, and she gave a fierce, angry snarl 
as she missed these two fat beavers that 
she had been so sure she was going to 
have for Bobby’s and Tommy’s supper. 
And then, at that very instant, she saw 
Father and Mother Beaver so close to the 
bank that she gave a swift, downward, 
stroke with one powerful paw, every claw 
out and ready to scratch and tear. But, 
again, she was just a scratch too late, for, 



52 THE BUSY BEAVERS OF ROUND-TOP 


with a swift turn, Father Beaver dragged 
poor, lame Mother Beaver with him out 
into the middle of the canal and very 
slowly they went back to their lodge. Oh, 
how good the little bed of soft grass felt 
to Mother Beaver after she had managed 
to swim up the little tunnel into the liv¬ 
ing-room! 

One hind paw was bruised and very 
lame, and every bone in her little body 
ached! But no bones had been broken 
and she knew that she would soon get 
well in the dear little house. Father 
Beaver brought in some very nice birch 
bark for her to chew on as she was lying 
on the soft grass bed, and altogether, she 
was a very thankful little beaver! 



CHAPTER IV 

FATHER BEAVER'S ADVENTURE 

With Mother Beaver so lame that she 
could scarcely swim at all, poor Father 
Beaver knew that he had to work harder 
than ever to get their lodge finished and 
the food gathered for winter. So the 
next day he was hard at work again, 
barely taking time even to eat his meals. 
Jack Frost had crept all over the roof of 
the lodge the night before, freezing the 
mud into a layer as hard as concrete, and 
Father Beaver knew that he must get an¬ 
other layer of twigs and sticks and grass 
all over the house and cover it with a thick 
coating of mud besides, ready for Jack to 
freeze that night. So back and forth he 

swam, carrying big branches in his teeth 

63 


54 THE BUSY BEAVERS OF ROUND-TOP 


by throwing them partly over his shoul¬ 
der and swimming with them to the lodge. 
Mrs. Beaver limped bravely out of the 
house and gnawed the bark off of most of 
the branches, while Father Beaver 
quickly put them on the house and began 
to scoop up mud and earth for the plas¬ 
tering. 

Dear Mrs. Beaver helped as much as 
she could, but she could really do very 
little, and Father Beaver had just man¬ 
aged to put the last bit of mud on that 
night when Jack Frost arrived and began 
to freeze it harder and harder. 

All the next day and the next, Father 
Beaver worked as hard as he knew how, 
and now Mrs. Beaver could help, too, for 
she could once more swim to the canal for 
sticks and branches. And Jack Frost 
worked just as hard as did Father 
Beaver, for he had all the other little 
lodges to freeze as well as Father Bea- 



FATHER BEAVER’S ADVENTURE 55 


vers. And besides, he had ail of his 
painting to do. Every sumach tip along 
the mountainside had to be painted red, 
and all the little grapes on the long, 
swinging grape-vines had to have his icy 
breath blown on them to turn them into 
sweet, delicious fruit! 

All the work of painting the trees and 
bushes had to be done, too, before he 
could do the work he liked best of all,— 
turn the little streams and ponds into ice! 
Oh, how he loved to catch the little drops 
of water and blow on them until they 
turned into frosty little drops of ice! 
But all of this other work must be done 
first, and so he dashed over the mountain¬ 
side and raced over the meadows. He 
hurried so one night that he tripped and 
fell in the little ravine and spilled so much 
of his paint on the trees on the edge of the 
gully that he only had a very little left for 
the other side of the mountain! 



56 THE BUSY BEAVEBS OF BOUND-TOP 


But he did very good work everywhere 
else and Father and Mother Beaver’s 
house was frozen so solidly that it seemed 
as if it were made of rock! The little 
mound-like house was now about five feet 
high and ten or eleven feet wide. And 
now the hardest task of all remained for 
Father and Mother Beaver,—to finish 
getting in their store of food, plenty to 
last all winter until gentle spring came 
with her sunshine and smiles to melt the 
hard little heart of Jack Frost! Some¬ 
times it was very late before she could do 
this, and unless plenty of bark were safely 
stored away, Father and Mother Beaver 
might get hungry before the ice-cover 
melted from the Pond and let them out of 
their lodge. 

All of the other beavers were busily at 
work getting their food, and every day 
some of them had to work on the dam to 
see that it was in good condition, not only 



FATHER BEAVER’S ADVENTURE 57 


to hold the water back all winter, but to 
keep the canals full now so that they 
could easily float their quantities of food- 
logs and branches home. Father and 
Mother Beaver worked harder than any 
other little family in town. They were the 
oldest and wisest of the beaver colony, 
and so they knew better than anyone else 
how necessary it was to get food and 
plenty of it before winter came. 

There were alders and aspens and pop¬ 
lars and birches to be cut down, and as 
only the soft, inner bark was what they 
liked best to eat, a big supply of trees 
would be necessary before they could feel 
certain that they had enough. And so, 
one afternoon, they started earnestly up 
the Pond to finish this work as speedily 
as possible. Side by side they swam up 
to the Big Canal. A log, cut by Father 
Beaver, rested with one end on the bank 
and right on that log was something that 



58 THE BUSY BEAVERS OF ROUND-TOP 


made the beavers stop swimming in¬ 
stantly. It was a very large skunk! 

Now the beavers were very much 
larger than Jack Skunk or any of his 
family, but well did they know of the 
weapon that Jack and each of his family 
possesses and from which all the forest- 
folk flee! And so Mr. and Mrs. Beaver 
decided that the best thing to do was to 
leave him absolutely alone. Giving the 
water a sharp slap with their tails, the 
beavers dived under the Pond and swam 
for a long, long way under the water, not 
coming to the surface until they were 
near the farther shore of the Pond where 
some very large trees grew and where 
several small canals had been dug 
through the woodland. 

All was peaceful and quiet on this side 
of the Pond, and Father and Mother 
Beaver waddled out on the bank to look 
at the trees and to decide just what ones 




FATHER BEAVER’S ADVENTURE 59 


to cut down. They preferred the other 
side of the Pond just now, for the trees 
on this side were so large that it would 
take a long time to cut them down. How¬ 
ever, since Jack Skunk was over there, 
they must make the best they could of 
things and get to work. 

A big muskrat, all furry and fuzzy, 
swam lazily down one of the canals, 
glancing carelessly at Father and Mother 
Beaver. The muskrat and the beaver 
families are very good friends and often¬ 
times, during the long, cold winter, a 
tired muskrat will creep into one of the 
underground tunnels of a beaver-house 
and go to sleep there. And the beavers 
are very glad to let him stay. 

Seeing that Mr. Muskrat was just idly 
swimming around, the beavers knew that 
no enemy was near and they began work 
at once. The leaves on the trees had been 
turned into such beautiful colors that 




60 THE BUSY BEAVERS OF ROUND-TOP 


each tree looked like a huge, stained- 
glass window through which the squir¬ 
rels and chipmunks hopped in and 

out. 

Mother Gray-Squirrel had trained all 
of her children to race fearlessly through 
the trees by this time, and they darted up 
and down the trees and leaped from limb 
to limb so rapidly that poor Mrs. Beaver 
watched them in terror! Surely they 
would fall and kill themselves! But not 
a mishap occurred and soon they all 
dashed merrily away to some nut trees up 
on the hill. 

Father and Mother Beaver were really 
very glad when the squirrels went away. 
They chattered so to each other, and 
quarreled with the chipmunks, and 
scolded the red squirrels until it quite 
made the poor beavers’ ears ache! 

By working as rapidly as they knew 
how, it was not long before both Father 



FATHER BEAVER'S ADVENTURE 61 


and Mother Beaver had cut down a good- 
sized tree. Not a single tooth-stroke had 
been wasted. Each one bit into the tree 
at just the right angle, and no wood- 
chopper with a sharp axe could have 
made a better job of it than did these lit¬ 
tle animals with only their sharp teeth to 
work with. 

After the trees were down, each beaver 
began to cut off all the branches, and 
these were dragged to the water and 
floated down the Pond to the deep water 
right in front of their lodge. Arriving 
over this spot, the beavers dived down 
under the water and fastened the branches 
to the bottom of the Pond by heaping 
mud and small stones on them. Soon 
they had such a pile that they could stick 
the fresh branches into it and hold them 
down by interlacing them with the sticks 
already there. Some of the larger 
branches were held in place by sticking 



62 THE BUSY BEAVERS OF ROUND-TOP 


them firmly into the muddy bottom of the 
Pond. 

By the time that night had come, all of 
the branches from the two trees had been 
brought down from the woods, and Fa¬ 
ther and Mother Beaver were now ready 
to cut up the trees themselves into logs to 
float to the lodge. Both Father and 
Mother Beaver were very tired, especially 
Mother Beaver, who still felt a twinge or 
two in her hurt foot if she worked for a 
long time. 

So when they had cut the trees up into 
small logs, they asked some of the other 
beavers to help roll the heaviest pieces to 
the water. Father Beaver had been such 
a good lumberman that the tree had 
fallen close to the water, but the large 
pieces cut off near the tree-stump had to 
be pushed and rolled to the canal. Their 
friends were glad to help, and pushing 
with small forepaws and shoulders, wad- 



FATHER BEAVER’S ADVENTURE 63 


dling along on their awkward, short back 
legs, they worked hard to get the logs 
over the bumps and tufts of grass and old 
tree-roots that were in the way. 

Father Beaver was very strong and he 
wanted to roll all of his logs by himself, 
letting the other beavers help Mother 
Beaver; and in this way, poor Father 
Beaver met with a very serious adventure 
and one that nearly cost him his life. It 
was just the right kind of a night for a 
beaver to work. The beautiful, fall day 
had turned into a rainy night and this was 
the sort of weather that all beavers love. 
The steady rain was making the water 
rise in the Pond and canals, and this 
pleased them all very much. 

Just beside the stump where Father 
Beaver was working was a little hollow, 
and into this had fallen a big limb that 
had broken off from the tree as it fell. 
Father Beaver had gone back for the last 



64 THE BUSY BEAVERS OF ROUOT)-TOP 


piece of log when he saw this branch, and 
thinking of the many tender bits of bark 
it would give, he picked it up by its heavi¬ 
est end, and rising on his hind legs the 
better to drag the branch along, he began 
to waddle with it to the water. He had to 
lean back so far to keep the branch out of 
his way that, if it had not been for his tail, 
he might have fallen over backwards. 
Even with the help of this stiff prop, he 
had hard work to get along. Step by 
step, however, he came nearer and nearer 
to the water. Then, when only a little 
way from the bank, his left hind-foot 
broke through the thin roof of a tunnel 
made by a muskrat, he slipped with a 
sharp wrench of his foot, lost his balance 
and rolled down a small hill, the branch 
falling on top of him. 

And there he lay, with such a pain in 
the poor little hind-foot that he thought 
he would never be able to walk again nor 



FATHER BEAVER’S ADVENTURE 65 


ever get back to the dear, safe lodge- 
house. Mother Beaver and the others 
were working as busily as they could, get¬ 
ting the logs into the water and swim¬ 
ming with them to the lodges, while the 
rain splashed softly down on their little 
brown noses as they stuck out of the 
water. 

Only one little beaver was left at work 
on the bank at the time that Father Bea¬ 
ver fell, and he was so busy that he did 
not know that anything had occurred at 
all. 

Now, as it happened, this was the very 
kind of a night that Mrs. Fox liked, too. 
The noise of the rain kept many little ani¬ 
mals from hearing her, if, by chance, her 
paws broke a twig or sent a small stone 
rolling down a hill. She had heard the 
beavers working as they cut down the 
trees that day, and well did she know that 
they would be back to finish their work 



66 THE BUSY BEAVERS OF ROUND-TOP 


that night. When the heavy, pouring 
rain came she was sure that it would help 
her get a nice, fat beaver for supper. 

Now the beavers were far too wise not 
to be on the lookout for just such prowl¬ 
ers as Mrs. Fox. But in spite of all their 
watchfulness, Mrs. Fox had managed to 
get very close to them in the darkness. 
The rain screened her so that she felt per¬ 
fectly sure that she was going to be able 
to get a most delicious supper. The bea¬ 
vers, however, went in and out of the 
water so much and so quickly that, as yet, 
she had not dared venture a spring. Not 
until she spied Father Beaver waddling 
along with the branch, did she think that 
the time had come for her supper. 

Cautiously she crept along behind him, 
hesitating to leap on him with the branch 
spreading out over his shoulder, for fear 
it might prevent her grabbing him. And 
then, to her amazement, he fell over and 



FATHER BEAVER’S ADVENTURE 67 


rolled down hill, and then,—she didn’t see 
him there at all! Instead, she saw what 
she supposed was Father Beaver right at 
the edge of the bank. 

How he got there so quickly she could 
not tell. What Mrs. Fox did not know 
was that another beaver beside Father 
Beaver was still at work. So, thinking 
that in some manner which the rain had 
kept her from seeing, he had reached the 
edge of the bank, and fearing that at any 
moment he would start swimming for 
home, Mrs. Fox leaped right over the 
very spot where Father Beaver was ly¬ 
ing! The other beaver did not see her 
coming, however, but calmly slipped into 
the water just in time to escape her! 

How poor Father Beaver trembled as 
he saw his deadly enemy leaping from the 
little hill just above him! 

Then he watched her with frightened, 
staring eyes, expecting every moment to 



68 THE BUSY BEAYEKS OF EOU^ r D-TOP 


have her turn and catch him. But the 
friendly little branch had covered him so 
well that she could not see him, and the 
wind and rain were helping to hide his 
scent. So, as she passed by, Father Bea¬ 
ver very cautiously and painfully crept 
out from under the branch, and although 
his sprained back-leg hurt him dread¬ 
fully, he waddled as softly and as fast as 
he could go toward the upper part of the 
canal. 

Father Beaver was very brave, as all 
beavers are when danger faces them, but 
even he thought that he would never be 
able to reach the water before Mrs. Fox 
would see him! And now her quick ears 
caught a slight sound as he hobbled and 
limped as rapidly as he could toward the 
canal. The rain poured down harder 
than ever, as if to keep Mrs. Fox from 
knowing where he was, and the wind blew 
the scent of him away up the canal, but 



FATHER BEAVER’S ADVENTURE 69 


Mrs. Fox was not to be fooled! With 
quick bounds she leaped along the bank! 
Father Beaver heard her coming! Could 
he reach the friendly water? Oh, if only 
his foot did not pain so terribly, and if 
only he did not have quite so far to go, 
and oh, if only a little beaver could go 
faster when on land! 

Mrs. Fox stopped once more to listen 
and then,—she saw him! Two bounds 
and her sharp teeth clicked savagely to¬ 
gether on Father Beaver’s back just as he 
gave one last, frantic waddle that carried 
him into the canal! Fortunately for Fa¬ 
ther Beaver, Mrs. Fox had only caught 
him by the fur. For just a moment those 
wicked teeth held him and then, as he 
struggled, the hair pulled through her 
teeth and then down he went with a final 
wrench that tore out a big piece of his 
fur! It hurt him,—hurt him terribly, but 
what did he care for a little thing like 



70 THE BUSY BEAVERS OF ROUNDTOP 


that? He was safe ,—or would be as soon 
as he could manage to get to the little 
lodge-house! 

Slowly and painfully he pushed 
through the water, coming at last to his 
underground doorway. Mother Beaver 
was already inside the living-room and 
she watched poor Father Beaver very 
anxiously as he hobbled and limped across 
the room to a grassy bed along the wall. 
The cold water had helped the swelling of 
his hurt hind-foot and the pain was very 
much less. Mother Beaver brought him 
some tender buds and twigs to chew on as 
he told her of his very narrow escape. 
And, for fear that Mrs. Fox might still 
be hunting near the canal, Father and 
Mother Beaver decided to stay at home 
that night and take a good rest. 



CHAPTER V 


NEW CITIZENS IN BEAVER-TOWN 

When morning came, Father Beaver’s 

foot was very much better, and after he 

had taken several swims in the cold water, 

it felt very, very much better, so much 

better, in fact, that he determined to try 

to use it again that day. For the keen 

morning wind that blew down from old 

Round-Top, and out across the Pond, 

brought him some very important news— 

old Winter would soon reach Round- 

Top. The wind was tearing and ripping 

the leaves off the trees and piling them 

up in brilliant gold and yellow heaps. 

Some of them blew gaily across the Bea- 

ver-Pond and some even fluttered on top 

of the lodge as if they would be glad to 

71 


72 THE BEST BEAVERS OF ROUND-TOP 


get inside the cosy house. All this told of 
the coming of winter very plainly to Fa¬ 
ther Beaver. 

The storehouse down at the bottom of 
the Pond was almost full. Another day 
or two of work and he felt sure that he 
would have plenty of food. So very 
bravely, he started with Mrs. Beaver to 
swim up to the Big Canal where there 
were smaller trees to get. Neither Jack 
Skunk nor Mrs. Fox was to be seen, and 
although his foot hurt him very much at 
times, Father Beaver worked just as hard 
as if nothing were the matter with him. 
When the pain became too hard to bear, 
he would plunge into the icy, cold water 
and paddle around for a while, which 
was just the best medicine in the world 
for his leg. 

All that day and night, every beaver 
in the little town worked very hard, for 
they knew just as well as did Father 



NEW CITIZENS IN BEAVEB-TOWN 73 


Beaver that there was not a moment to be 
lost. Bark was stripped from the logs 
and the logs themselves thrown out into 
the Pond to be floated down to the dam 
to help in making it strong enough to last 
all winter. If the dam broke, all the 
water in the Beaver-Pond would pour 
out, and their front doors would be wide 
open for all the wolves and foxes and ot¬ 
ters to walk right in! Oh, the dam was 
very important, and mud and stones and 
logs and then more mud and stones and 
logs were piled on its inner surface and 
across its top, until it was just as firm as 
a stone wall. 

All the leaves were gone from the trees 
by the time this work was done, and the 
North Wind tore and raced wildlv over 
the old Hill, piling the leaves high around 
the roots of the Hollow Spruce where 
Mollie Rabbit lived, and heaping them up 
over Mrs. Groundhog’s burrow to keep 



74 THE BUSY BEAVERS OF ROUND TOP 


her warm as she slept all winter. Every 
night Jack Frost came to freeze up a lit¬ 
tle bit of water here or nip a bush there 
that still was so foolish as to have its sap 
up in its branches. 

All the big trees and bushes and finally 
even the smallest shrubs sent their sap 
way down in their roots to stay until 
spring, and then, one night, Jack Frost 
came merrily over the Hill, riding on the 
back of the North Wind. Together they 
chased the clouds pell-mell across the sky 
and upset them until the little snowflakes 
came tumbling down. How they blew 
and flew around into every crack and cor¬ 
ner of the dear old Hill! Mother Lynx’s 
cave was all covered up and so was 
Grandfather Black-Bear’s den ’way up 
on top of the mountain! 

Over the Beaver-Pond, Jack Frost 
rode gaily while the North Wind grew 
colder and colder. Down Jack would 



NEW CITIZENS IN BEAVER TOWN 75 


swoop, touching the Pond with his icy 
wand, and wherever he struck, long trails 
of ice followed after. Again and again, 
over and back and up and down he 
scampered. Oh, but he was happy, for 
this was just the work he liked best of all. 
He tumbled the snowflakes down into the 
water and locked them in with long bars 
of ice! Up the little ravine he dashed, 
freezing the edges of the tumbling, little 
stream, turning its spray into frozen 
foam. He was the merriest, busiest little 
fellow on all Round-Top, and when Fa¬ 
ther Beaver swam out of his front door 
the next morning, behold!—the Pond was 
securely shut in with a firm, white roof, 
under which he and all the other beavers 
could safely romp and play. 

It was like a large, white tent and Fa¬ 
ther and Mother Beaver were very happy 
to see it, and so were all the other beavers 
in the little town; and they all came out 



76 THE BUSY BEAVEBS OF KOUND-TOP 


and frolicked around in the water and 
swam and dived and chewed pieces of 
hark from their storerooms and had a 
wonderful time. This was vacation-time 
now, with nothing to do but lie on the 
soft, grassy beds and chew the delicious 
bark from the logs, tossing the logs out 
again into the Pond where they would 
float around until needed next spring to 
repair the dam. 

All winter they rested and played and 
ate bark, and every little beaver had put 
in such a good supply of food that there 
was still plenty left when Spring came 
back to Round-Top, and opened all the 
doors on the mountain that Jack Frost 
had locked with his icy bolts and bars. 
Like Jack, she flew merrily over the 
mountain, only she came with the warm, 
South Wind, and where J ack had used ice 
and snow, she used warm rains and sunny 
skies. Jack’s helpers were cold and ice 



NEW CITIZENS IN BEAVEB-TOWN 77 


and sleet and snow, but her gay little sol¬ 
diers were the sunbeams and the South 
Wind and the clear, blue sky and the 
flowers. 

And when Long Pond once more 
rippled and twinkled in the warm spring 
days, each little beaver lodge held such a 
wonderful secret that the Beaver-Pond 
told it to the little stream and he carried 
it down to Long Pond and then the wind 
learned it,—how, no one knows. But 
learn it he did and soon all the animals on 
Round-Top knew that the prettiest, fluf¬ 
fiest little babies on the Hill were to be 
found in the lodges of the beavers! 

Some little houses held six babies and 
some only three. Father and Mother 
Beaver thought their four babies were the 
nicest little familv in all the Beaver- 
Town and the wisest, smartest chil¬ 
dren as well. And perhaps they were, 
or, maybe it was just the very good care 



78 THE BUSY BEAVERS OF ROUND-TOP 


they had that made them grow so rapidly. 
And so it was not long before they were 
sitting up in the warm, comfortable liv¬ 
ing-room gnawing little twigs just as 
they saw Father and Mother Beaver do¬ 
ing! Such fuzzy, pretty little babies as 
they were, with their silky fur, their small, 
round heads and their bright twinkling 
eyes. And their very small paws looked 
like little pink hands as they carefully 
held their birch twigs. 

Mother and Father Beaver were both 
very proud of them and Father Beaver 
helped just the best he knew how to take 
care of them. He stayed very closely at 
home and helped play with them and care 
for them as lovingly as any furry father 
possibly could. Oh, what fun they had 
romping around the big living-room,— 
for the little baby beavers, now about the 
size of kittens, were as full of play as a 
lot of little puppies. They would run 



NEW CITIZENS IN BEAVER-TOWN 79 


down the tunnels and look out into the 
deep water of the Pond, only to scamper 
back again in fear of the water that tried 
to look its best and friendliest for them. 

They watched Father and Mother 
Beaver with eager, twinkling eyes as they 
waddled down the tunnels for a swim 
near the front door. But they had no de¬ 
sire to try it for themselves. And then, 
one day when the sun was so hot that the 
water was as warm as toast, Father and 
Mother Beaver took them down the tun¬ 
nels and out into the warm, friendly 
waters. Oh, how scared they were! 
Baby Brother just whimpered and cried 
with fright, while Big Sister trembled 
and shook so that she did not dare go out 
any farther than just the very doorstep of 
the little house! First, she put out one 
little paw and then another, only to draw 
them back in fright! 

The two other children, however, 




80 THE BUSY BEAVERS OF ROUND-TOP 


learned to swim quite well, and Father 
and Mother Beaver were so pleased with 
them, especially as they were the first 
children in all the little town to go for a 
swim. That night, when all was dark and 
cool, Mother Beaver took them out into 
the Pond again, and this time even Baby 
Brother forgot his fear and swam quite a 
little way in the velvety-looking water 
where the stars shone like golden balls. 
Then Mother Beaver took them back and 
put them to bed, and she and Father 
Beaver went swimming off for logs to use 
in repairing the dam and to keep up the 
stock of food. With four babies now to 
eat the delicious inner bark, they must 
work harder than ever to keep their store¬ 
house filled. 

Mother Beaver was very well satisfied 
with the way her babies were learning to 
swim, and she determined to take them up 
on their little island the next day if pos- 



NEW CITIZENS IN BEAVER-TOWN 81 

sible. Father Beaver would soon be go¬ 
ing away for the long vacation that he 
meant to take while the babies were so 
very little. The other fathers of Beaver- 
Town had already gone. The mothers 
seemed to be glad to be left alone with the 
children for a while, and Mother Beaver 
was very anxious to teach them as much 
as possible while Father Beaver was there 
to help her protect them. 

The next morning was a perfect 
beaver-day. It was raining hard. So, in 
their little rain-proof coats, Mother 
Beaver led them down the tunnel and into 
the Pond. They did not whimper and 
cry this time, but splashed into the water 
and kicked it about and dived around 
very much as if they were grown-up 
beavers. All this Mother Beaver saw 
with great delight and instead of taking 
them only to their own little island, she 
swam slowly with them to the shore of the 



82 THE BUSY BEAVEBS OF BOUND-TOP 


Pond. Father Beaver swam beside them, 
watching carefully to see that none grew 
so tired that it would try to stop swim¬ 
ming. At last they reached the shore, and 
what a beautiful place it was! The rain 
came down so hard that Mother Beaver 
felt sure that no enemy would be prowl¬ 
ing about, and she and Father Beaver 
and the four little baby beavers just had 
the most delightful time playing and 
frolicking around! 

They pushed each other over in the 
deep midsummer grass; they sat up on 
their funny little back-legs, while their 
funnier little tails tried to look like Fa¬ 
ther and Mother Beaver’s long, flat ones. 
Into the water they dived, pushing each 
other down the soft, slippery bank and 
having such a good time that Mother 
Beaver did not like to end the pretty play 
by taking them home. But Father 
Beaver was going away that very night 




HAVING SUCH A GOOD TIME THAT MOTHER 
BEAVER DID NOT LIKE TO TAKE THEM 
HOME. PAGE 82. 











NEW CITIZENS IN BEAVER-TOWN 83 


on his long vacation, and Mother Beaver 
felt that the safest place for the babies 
was at home and in bed. So down they 
all slid into the water and slowly they 
paddled home. 

Baby Brother was so tired from his 
play that he could hardly make his little 
back-feet go at all! But, at last, they 
reached the tunnel of the little house and 
there they had another lesson. Mr. and 
Mrs. Beaver taught them how to shake 
themselves in the tunnel so as not to carry 
wet fur up into the warm, dry living- 
room. And then they were given a lesson 
in combing their fur with both their front 
and hind paws until it was as dry and 
silky as a little beaver’s fur ought to be. 
Father and Mother Beaver sat right up 
in front of them and showed them how, 
and each little beaver did exactly as he 
was told. Then they went to bed and had 
their supper of poplar-bark in bed. 



84 THE BUSY BEATERS OF ROUKD-TQP 


Baby Brother was too tired to eat his 
supper and he went sound asleep with the 
little poplar-twig held tightly between his 
teeth. And that night, Father Beaver 
started away on his vacation to wander 
far up the canals and through the marshes 
and to have delightful swims in Long 
Pond. And all the mother-beavers 
stayed at home and taught their children 
how to gnaw off the twigs from trees and 
how to help repair the dam. It was a 
lovely, happy summer, full of lessons and 
play and work, and by the time the fa¬ 
ther-beavers came home, all the children 
in the town had grown so much and had 
learned so much that they were all ready 
to help with the hard work of getting 
ready for winter. 



CHAPTER VI 


LITTLE BROTHER MEETS SOME ENEMIES 

It was late summer once more and now 
the comfortable, old lodge-house had to 
be made larger to provide beds and room 
for the family of six that would live there 
that winter. The dam was being made 
higher and longer and this forced the 
water to rise until it would have covered 
the floors of all the living-rooms in all the 
beaver-houses, if they had not known of 
a very simple way to prevent this. The}^ 
just tore down quantities of the twigs and 
stones and moss and grass from the ceil¬ 
ings and walls of the living-rooms, and 
this was all packed down into the floor. 
This not only raised the ceilings to their 

proper height, but made the rooms longer 

85 


86 THE BUSY BEAVERS OF ROUND-TOP 


and wider as well. Even Baby Brother 
helped by tramping back and forth over 
the floor. He thought it great fun to 
give it loud whacks with his little tail, as 
this always made his mother and sisters 
jump with fright! 

It was a very funny sight to see them 
all waddling and tramping around, but, 
inch by inch, the floor was raised above 
the Pond. And now, more moss and 
stones and logs must be put on the out¬ 
side of the house, and all the little beavers 
worked very hard, carrying mud held 
tightly under their chins in their baby 
paws. The big logs and branches were 
brought to the lodge by Father and 
Mother Beaver, but all the children went 
along to bring home the smaller twigs to 
bury in the food-storehouse. Every lit¬ 
tle beaver in the town was working just 
as hard as he knew how, and late every 
afternoon the Pond was just filled with 



LITTLE BROTHER MEETS ENEMIES 87 


bobbing, brown heads as the little beavers 
went busily up and down between the 
woodland and their lodges. 

The dam was being made as tight and 
strong as possible to hold back the very 
large quantity of water that the friendly 
stream was pouring into it every day, and 
all the logs that had been stripped of their 
bark during the winter were being plas¬ 
tered into the dam. Big Sister and Little 
Sister were having lessons in learning 
how to make the walls of the living-room 
smooth and even. Everyone was busy 
and very happy. 

The little lodge was kept very neat and 
clean. No nibbled sticks were allowed to 
remain scattered about, but each little 
beaver was trained to carry his own share 
of twigs and branches out through the 
tunnels to be thrown into the Pond to be 
used again in some other way. And so, 
at bedtime, the floor was dry and clean 



88 THE BUSY BEAVERS OF ROUND-TOP 


and the beds very attractive with their 
piles of dry grass and soft, shredded 
cedar wood. 

Mother Beaver was a very good house¬ 
keeper, indeed, and the little lodge looked 
very clean and restful after the hard work 
of being lumbermen, and masons, and 
builders of dams and houses, and civil en¬ 
gineers, and canal diggers, and gatherers 
of food sufficient for six hungry beavers 
for all winter! And when sleepy-time 
came and the whole family was gathered 
in the room, now so big that it held them 
all without crowding, there were delight¬ 
ful playtimes and frolics. 

Mr. and Mrs. Beaver sometimes joined 
in the fun, but usually they were so tired 
that they just went right to bed directly 
after supper! The children had not 
worked as hard as had their father and 
mother and they were ready for a play. 
They would nudge and poke one another 



LITTLE BROTHER MEETS ENEMIES 89 


off the beds, grab hold of each other’s 
supper-sticks and pull them away, bite 
one another’s ears or, maybe, a foot as it 
poked out of the bed, and then they would 
end up by chasing each other down one 
tunnel, out into the Pond and back into 
the lodge by the other hallway. Oh, it 
was great fun, and such a splashing as 
there was and such shaking of wet coats 
in the hallways and such wet coats as 
sometimes crept into bed! It made Mrs. 
Beaver quite nervous and worried when 
they raced out into the Pond. Their 
deadliest enemy,—an otter,—might, by 
chance, come to the Pond and catch them! 
Or Mother Lynx might be hiding right 
beside the house and grab them with one 
swift stroke of her powerful paws. 

Well did Mother Beaver know what 
would happen then! There would be no 
little beaver left when Mother Lynx fin¬ 
ished with him! All these deadly enemies 



90 THE BUSY BEAVERS OF ROUND-TOP 


Mother Beaver had to think of. She had 
taught her children as much as she could 
about them. They knew the scent of all 
their worst enemies, even of Grandfather 
Black-Bear who had prowled one day 
through the marsh looking for berries. 
And they knew the wind’s rules and the 
Pond’s secrets. They had learned of all 
the kindly forest-people,—Mollie Rabbit 
and the squirrels and Mrs. Woodchuck. 
All this they had learned besides their 
lessons in building and lumbering, and 
Mother Beaver felt that they were very 
talented and wise children. One night, 
Big Sister had even gone to Long Pond 
with Father Beaver for some delicious 
lily roots! 

In fact, the children were fast getting 
very well able to take good care of them¬ 
selves, and Mother Beaver knew that by 
another summer they would know as 
much as she did herself; but, nevertheless, 



LITTLE BROTHEB MEETS ENEMIES 91 


all this splashing and dashing and racing 
around when they should have been in bed 
made her feel very anxious indeed! And, 
one night, she just determined to get 
those little beavers all in from the Pond 
and make them go to bed as little beavers 
ought to do! Then, after their rest, they 
would be ready to go out in the soft dark¬ 
ness and help her and Father Beaver 
work. 

Now, Little Brother had grown to be 
the boldest of all the little beaver-children 
and this time, when Big Sister chased him 
down through one tunnel, he did not run 
back through the other one, but swam far 
out into the Pond. And when Mother 
Beaver swam out and made Big Sister 
come in and go to bed, she did not see 
Little Brother at all! Little Brother 
splashed around for a little while by him¬ 
self, then he turned to go back to the little 
house. But what, oh, what was this huge 




82 THE BUSY BEAVERS OF ROUND-TOP 


thing that he saw slowly swimming close 
to the little lodge-house? Something 
that finally pulled itself up on the narrow 
strip of land around the house! 

One of the first laws that every little 
forest-baby has to learn is:—“ When you 
see anything new that you cannot under¬ 
stand, keep away! Ignorance is dan¬ 
ger! ” What this awful animal was, Lit¬ 
tle Brother did not know. But there it 
was, close by his house, and it could swim 
as well as he could and it would surely 
catch him if he tried to get home. There 
was only one thing to do:—warn the town 
of this danger and fly as fast as ever he 
could go to one of the many burrows that 
now filled the banks. With so many new 
little beavers in the village, the old 
beavers had decided that they needed 
plenty of burrows, and the banks of the 
Pond held great numbers of them. 

Giving the water as loud a whack as he 



LITTLE BROTHER MEETS ENEMIES 93 


knew how to do with his small tail, Little 
Brother dived down for the nearest bur¬ 
row. Now, if Little Brother had only 
been a little older, he would not have 
chosen this burrow at all, for it was an old 
one that Mrs. Fox had once dug into and 
its farthest end was all torn open, the old 
beavers not having discovered what had 
happened to it so as to repair it. 

An older and wiser beaver could have 
told by the volume of fresh air pouring 
down the tunnel that something was 
wrong with it, and possibly their very 
keen noses might even have caught the 
smell that would have spelled F-O-X. 
But Little Brother was too young and 
too frightened to think of these things. 
He was so thankful to escape this un¬ 
known enemy waiting for him in the 
Pond, that he fairly ran along the burrow 
to where he supposed he would find the 
nice, airy room where he could safely 



S4 THE BUSY BEAVERS OF ROUND-TOP 


hide. But instead of the safe room un¬ 
derneath an old tree, there he was right 
out in the air with nothing around him but 
some old, gray roots. 

And then, oh, what awful thing was 
this, crouching just ready to spring on 
him, with eyes that gleamed like two live 
coals! It was Mrs. Lynx who just hap¬ 
pened to see Little Brother as he came 
out of the tunnel! But even as she 
sprang with every cruel claw out just 
ready to clutch poor Little Brother, he 
turned and got back into the tunnel just 
out of the way! What awful adventures 
he was having this night! 

He did not dare go back into the Pond, 
for he was sure that terrible enemy was 
waiting for him right by his own dear 
front door. And if he stayed here in this 
broken old burrow, a fox or a wolf might 
come! Right in the middle of the tunnel 
he cowered in fear. And it was a very 



LITTLE BROTHER MEETS ENEMIES 95 


fortunate thing for him that plenty of air 
did get down into the burrow, for if it had 
not, poor Little Brother might have 
smothered in the stuffy place. Beavers 
do not require quite as much air as do the 
rest of the forest-people, which explains 
why they can stay so long and swim so far 
under water. But even they will drown 
or smother after a while, either in the 
water or in an airless burrow, and so it 
was a very good thing for Little Brother 
that the old North Wind was blowing 
hard that night as he tore right down into 
the tunnel. 

But, oh, how cold he was! And how 
he missed his soft, grassy bed, and how 
scared he was, and how hungry,—oh, how 
hungry! For Little Brother had played 
so very hard that he hadn’t taken even one 
chew of his delicious birch-stick supper. 
And his legs ached as he crouched all 
cramped up in the narrow tunnel. Oh, 



96 THE BUSY BEAVERS OF ROUND-TOP 


if only his soft, warm, furry mother were 
there, or even Big Sister so that he could 
cuddle up beside her! At last, he could 
not stand it another instant and he cried 
and whimpered as hard as he knew how. 

Now, this was a very dangerous thing 
to do, for if some of his digging-enemies, 
like Mrs. Fox or Grandfather Black- 
Bear, had heard him, it would have been 
the end of Little Brother. A little animal 
did hear him and crept to the very mouth 
of the burrow, but it was only a little rab¬ 
bit and she very soon hopped away. 
Then it seemed lonelier than ever and 
colder, too, and Little Brother cried 
harder than he did before. 

Whether Mother Beaver heard him or 
whether she missed him and just went 
hunting for him, no one can tell, but just 
when he was crying the hardest, she came 
right across the Pond to the entrance of 
the burrow. Little Brother was the very 



LITTLE BROTHER MEETS ENEMIES 97 


happiest beaver-baby in the whole Pond 
as he swam home close beside Mother 
Beaver. He looked in fear at his little 
house for there, right on a big log that 
stuck out of the water, was that other 
enemy of which he had been so afraid. 
But Mrs. Beaver did not seem to mind it 
at all, but just dived calmly down to her 
own front door with Little Brother fol¬ 
lowing after as quickly as he knew how. 
And if he had only known it, the dreadful 
enemy was not an enemy at all, but just 
a very, very, very large Grandfather 
Turtle from Long Pond that had lost his 
way and gotten into the Beaver-Pond by 
mistake. 



CHAPTER VII 


MR. OTTER GOES SLIDING 

It was not long before the icy roof 
again covered the Beaver-Pond. Every 
house was built as snug and secure as 
busv little hands could make them. Jack 
Frost had frozen the layers of mud until 
each little lodge seemed made of stone. 
Had Jack not done this, Grandfather 
Black-Bear would soon have torn them 
apart with his ripping, tearing claws, and 
he and the wolves would have eaten the 
beavers one by one until the whole little 
town would have been gone. But Grand¬ 
father Black-Bear could not get even one 
claw into the firm roofs that the busy lit¬ 
tle paws had made, and so the beavers felt 

very cosy and happy as the big ice-tent 

98 


MR. OTTER GOES SLIDING 


99 


was fastened securely down around the 
Pond. 

Each storehouse was filled full of 
food, and now the young beavers had 
nothing to do but play and eat and grow 
fat and strong and big. At first, Big Sis¬ 
ter and Little Brother and the other 
beaver children seemed to do nothing at 
all but just get fatter and fatter until 
they looked like round, furry balls. But 
soon they began to lengthen out and so 
rapidly did they seem to stretch out that 
they began to look almost thin. Their 
tails grew amazingly and so did their yel¬ 
low front teeth. 

Little Brother’s teeth grew the most 
rapidly of all and they were a very deep 
orange color. His mother thought he 
was a very handsome little beaver-boy in¬ 
deed ! He was no longer content to chew 
the little twigs and branches, but took the 
largest sticks he could find in the store- 



100 THE BUSY BEAVEKS OF BOUND-TOP 


house and gnawed away at them until the 
muscles in his neck and shoulders grew 
strong and powerful. 

He would drag a short, thick log into 
the house and then he would show his 
brother and sisters how he could cut it up. 
This was one of his favorite games. 
Around the whole log, his teeth-chisels 
would cut a wide groove, making the 
groove wider as he got deeper into the 
wood, until the little log would look very 
much like an hour glass and it only 
needed one last bite to snap it apart. 
Then there would be two logs instead of 
one, with nicely-pointed ends like a very 
large, sharpened lead pencil. 

Now if this had been a growing tree in 
the woodland, he would have been too 
wise to have taken those last nips, for he 
would have known that the weight of the 
tree would make it crash down and might 
and, very probably, would have crashed 



ME. OTTEE GOES SLIDING 


101 


his little head along with it! But with 
the logs in the lodge, he had to make a 
complete job of it and so he bit it clear 
through. 

Big and Little Sister and Big Brother 
soon learned to do this, too, and they 
practised at it so earnestly that their neck 
muscles grew just as strong as Little 
Brother’s, and Mother Beaver could see 
very plainly that, when summer came, she 
and Father Beaver would have plenty of 
help in all the hard work they must do. 

When the little beavers tired of this 
play, they would swim out into the Pond, 
where they could safely splash and dive 
and race around in play with all the other 
little beavers. There were so many of 
these children playing in the water that 
Father Beaver looked quite worried, for 
he realized that the little town was going 
to grow so rapidly that the dam must be 
made very much higher and longer, so 



102 THE BUSY BEAVERS OF ROUND-TOP 


that many trees could be reached, as 
quantities would be needed for food and 
for the dam. 

He was lying on his grass-bed one day, 
chewing some especially fine bark, and all 
the little beavers were out at play in the 
Pond, when a most peculiar sound 
reached his ears. He leaped out of bed 
and swam quickly into the Pond where 
the frightened little beavers were listen¬ 
ing to this same sound. In a moment, 
they all swam for home as fast as they 
could go. 

But Father Beaver remained in the 
Pond, swimming slowly and carefully 
around. Utter silence enclosed the whole 
place and then, suddenly, there came a 
sharp thump on the ice, followed by a 
long swish-wsh-sh clear to the middle of 
the Pond, and then the sound of claws 
scratching over the ice as some animal 
walked back to the shore. 



MR OTTER GOES SLIDING 


103 


Perfectly sure that the animal, what¬ 
ever it was, could not get down through 
the very thick icy roof to harm him, Fa¬ 
ther Beaver swam cautiously up and 
down and across the Pond. Thump!— 
thump! came the noise again and then the 
long swish—wshsh—sh! This was too 
much for Father Beaver to stand! As 
the oldest and wisest beaver in all the lit¬ 
tle town, he just felt that he must find 
out what was the cause of all this and de¬ 
termine, if possible, if it meant any harm 
to the little Beaver-Town. 

So off he swam to the burrow that he 
and Mother Beaver had made so long ago 
in the bank, and through it he waddled 
until he came to one of the little air-holes 
underneath the old beech-tree. Jack 
Frost and King Winter and the little 
snowflakes had frozen over and covered 
up most of the openings, but there was 
one on the south side of the tree that was 




104 THE BUSY BEAVERS OF ROUND-TOP 


just as he and Mother Beaver had left it. 
In fact, it was even wider than they had 
first made it, for the rain had crumbled 
the soft earth around its edges and Fa¬ 
ther Beaver could poke his whole head 
through the opening. 

Cautiously and very slowly, oh, very 
cautiously and slowly, his little nose came 
through the mouth of the tunnel, soon 
followed by his sleek brown head with its 
gleaming, bright eyes. It was the close 
of a winter’s day and Father Beaver 
hardly knew the Pond or the little wood¬ 
land at the bottom of old Round-Top. 
There were no leaves on the trees and 
everywhere and over everything was a 
glistening, gleaming white, puffy blanket 
of snow. 

All the canals were filled in so deeply 
that Father Beaver could not have told 
where they were at all. Ice and snow 
completely covered the dam until it was 



MR. OTTER GOES SLIDING 


105 


nowhere to be seen. The brown stumps 
of the trees that he and Mother Beaver 
had left there in the fall were ail gone, 
and in their places were funny, white 
mounds of snow and ice. Even the 
branches of the trees did not look as Fa¬ 
ther Beaver had always seen them, for 
many of them were covered with pieces of 
this same white blanket. Father Bea¬ 
ver's bright eyes stared and stared in 
wonder. He even forgot what he had 
come to the burrow for! 

The sun was just setting behind the old 
Hill (that did not look like his hill at all!) 
and it shot long streaks of red and pink 
and yellow light out across the snow until 
it, too, looked red and pink and yellow. 
Father Beaver stared in wonder, and 
then his eye caught sight of something 
near by that quickly made him lose in¬ 
terest in the queer way that the Pond and 
woods appeared! 



106 THE BUSY BEAVERS OF ROUND-TOP 


Near the foot of the Hill was a very 
high mound of snow that had blown and 
drifted in near the spot where the Big 
Canal was. And down this hill came his 
deadliest enemy,—the otter! Lying flat 
on his fur stomach, with his fore-feet 
doubled back under him, the otter had 
given a stout push with his hind-legs and, 
head foremost, he was sliding down the 
snowy, icy mound! 

Thump! he struck the ice of the Pond! 
Swish-wshsh—he went gliding half-way 
across it. Then, straightening out his 
front feet, he got awkwardly up on his 
four short legs and scrambled and slipped 
back to the snowy mound. Digging in 
his sharp nails he climbed up to the top 
and, without pausing for breath, down he 
shot again! Oh, but he was having the 
best time that an otter ever can have! 
For otters would rather slide than eat! 
And when thev cannot find ice and snow 





THE OTTER WAS SLIDING DOWN THE 
SNOWY. ICY MOUND. PAGE 106. 














MR. OTTER GOES SLIDING 


107 


to slide on, they will make a mud-slide on 
the soft stream-banks and coast down un¬ 
til they make a deep trough in the mud! 

Oh, but Mr. Otter was having a good 
time and, as he scrambled and climbed 
around, he looked so playful and so 
happy that it was very hard to believe 
that he would just be tickled to pieces if 
he could catch and eat up dear old Father 
Beaver. And poor Father Beaver was 
dreadfully, most dreadfully worried at 
seeing this enemy here! When he and 
Mrs. Beaver had first settled at the foot 
of the Hill, he had been quite sure that an 
otter lived over in Long Pond, and he 
and Mrs. Beaver and all the other beavers 
had alwavs been on the lookout for him. 

Now, Father Beaver had been right in 
thinking that an otter lived in Long 
Pond, for he did. What Father Beaver 
could not know, of course, was that this 
otter had furnished a fine meal for 




108 THE BUSY BEAVERS OF ROUND-TOP 


Mother Lynx. As time passed and no 
otter came to trouble the little colony, 
Father Beaver felt that he had been mis¬ 
taken and that these cruel enemies did not 
live in this part of the country. 

And now, here was one sliding right 
over the icy roof of the Beaver-Town! 
And if a thaw should come, or the otter 
managed in some way to get down under 
the ice, poor Father Beaver shuddered to 
think what would happen to the little 
children of Beaver-Town! For Mr. Ot¬ 
ter was just as much at home in the water 
as was Father Beaver. Moreover, he was 
a foot larger than Father Beaver and was 
known to be a fierce, cruel fighter! 

Oh, how scared Mr. Beaver was as he 
thought of what might happen to his lit¬ 
tle town! If only this cruel enemy would 
go away! But Father Beaver was sure 
that he would manage to stay around now 
all winter, and when spring came, 



ME. OTTEE GOES SLIDING 


109 


he would just gobble them up one by 
one! 

Father Beaver was just about to crawl 
hopelessly back down the burrow and 
spread the sad news to the fathers and 
mothers in the town, when he saw some¬ 
thing that froze him in his place with fear 
and curiosity and terror all combined. A 
big hemlock tree hung its powerful, long 
arms out high above the snowy mound 
and, just as Mr. Otter climbed again to 
the top for another delightful slide, a 
gray shape on the branch of the tree gath¬ 
ered itself together for a powerful spring. 
Down it came, with ripping, tearing 
claws, right on the back of the otter and 
that was the end of the otter’s sliding, for 
Mrs. Lynx was having him for supper! 
And Father Beaver very thankfully 
crawled down the burrow and went home 
to bed! 



CHAPTER VIII 


THE FOREST FIRE 

When spring came once more to the 
Beaver-Town, Mr. and Mrs. Beaver had 
five more babies to care for, and the little 
house seemed filled to overflowing with 
five small babies, four half-grown chil¬ 
dren and Father and Mother Beaver. 
And, as every little lodge in the town was 
just about as well-filled, it was very evi¬ 
dent that there would be plenty of work 
to do that summer! For now the elder 
brothers and sisters had to work just as 
hard as their fathers and mothers, and 
they had to help care for the babies, be¬ 
sides. 

Again, the living-room had to be en¬ 
larged and the Pond had to be deepened, 

110 


THE FOEEST FIRE 


111 


and the floor raised above the water, and 
the ceiling torn out and raised higher, and 
there was the outside to be rebuilt again! 
And just twice as much food must be 
gathered for this winter’s food-closet as 
was needed last year. Big Brother and 
Little Brother didn’t mind all the work 
very much, however, as they were large 
enough now to go on the summer trip 
with Father Beaver and all the other fa¬ 
thers and half-grown boys. And they 
had a fine time hunting for delicious lily 
roots in Long Pond and in swimming up 
and down the fine, big Pond and sleeping 
in small burrows along its banks. 

Of course, Bobby Lynx, who was quite 
grown up by this time, knew all about 
these beavers away from home on this 
trip, and many a foolish, little beaver was 
caught that thought he did not have to 
obey the most important of all beaver- 
rules:—“Always stay near enough to 



112 THE BUSY BEAVERS OF ROUND-TOP 


water to be able to reach it before an 
enemy can reach you! ” Bobby Lynx 
found these foolish beavers, and so did 
several members of the very numerous 
fox-family. 

But Big Brother and Little Brother, 
although they had some very narrow es¬ 
capes and very thrilling adventures, met 
with no serious accident, and when thev 
finally came home with Father Beaver at 
the end of their vacation, they had grown 
so big and strong and had such very 
large, yellow teeth and such long, scaly 
tails that Mother Beaver hardly knew 
them! 

Big Sister and Little Sister had been 
growing, too. In fact, they were as large 
as their brothers, and Father and Mother 
Beaver thought they were the finest and 
handsomest children in all the little vil¬ 
lage. And now, the whole family went 
swimming and splashing about the Pond 



THE FOKEST FIEE 


113 


on the lovely summer nights. The yellow 
lily roots, of which they were so very 
fond, had begun to grow in the Beaver- 
Pond, and delicious water-grasses were 
to be had in abundance. There was no 
hurry about rebuilding their lodges, for 
winter was a long way off, and so they 
had plenty of time for swims in the warm, 
friendly waters. 

So many new canals had been dug and 
so many, many trees cut down, that Mr. 
and Mrs. Beaver scarcely knew the place 
any more. The little army of trees that 
had once threatened to crowd Long Pond 
out of their way, were all gone and the 
Beaver-Pond was growing so long and 
wide, now, that it began to look like Long 
Pond’s little sister. The dam was so long 
and so wide that some little seeds, which 
the wind had carried there, decided to 
grow and live on the dam, and so many 
of them were there that the dam was just 



114 THE BUSY BEAVERS OF ROUND-TOP 


a mass of pretty green plants and bushes 
all summer. 

The beavers went to and from the new 
lumbering places without much fear. 
The wolves that lived on the other side of 
the mountain found so much to eat in 
these warm, summer days, that they grew 
lazv and less fierce and did not bother to 
come down near Long Pond all that 
summer. Grandmother and Grandfa¬ 
ther Black-Bear found so manv delicious 
berries and roots on the mountainside, 
that they grew sleek and fat and lazy, too, 
and they did not come near the Beaver- 
Pond, either. And the Hill was so filled 
with rabbits and grouse and partridges 
that even the prowling, sly foxes were 
not tempted to come down to the Pond at 
all. 

The beavers were hard at work now 
cutting down trees. Everywhere through 
the woodlands could be heard the swish 



THE FOREST FIRE 


115 


—crack,—swish—crack! of falling trees, 
and the Beaver-Pond was filled with 
beavers pushing food-logs to their store¬ 
houses. The young beavers worked as 
hard as the old ones and there was not a 
lazy, shiftless beaver in the colony! Fa¬ 
ther Beaver set such a good example, that 
any beaver would have been ashamed not 
to work as hard as he knew how. 

Of course,—there were accidents. 
Some of the trees fell on a few of the lit¬ 
tle beavers, and some of them wandered 
away and got lost and didn’t come back 
anv more, and there were some fierce 
fights. But, for all that, things went 
along very well and the little town was 
growing so rapidly that it would soon be 
a city! 

And then,—something was wrong! 
No one could tell just what it was,—but 
there was surely something. The beavers 
had worked as hard as they knew how to 






116 THE BUSY BEAVERS OF ROUND-TOP 


be prepared for fall, and fall did not 
come! It was the Moon of the Red Leaf 
and the leaves were still green. It was 
time for Jack Frost and Jack Frost did 
not come. Day after day the hot sun 
blazed down on the Hill, and the little 
springs and streams began to dry up, and 
the pond-stream trickled very slowly 
down the mountainside. The leaves be¬ 
gan to turn a dingy brown on the trees 
instead of red, and they fell off very 
slowly. And still Jack Frost did not 
come. 

It was the Month of the Harvest 
Moon, now, and Jack Frost should have 
been there bv this time and have frozen 
several layers of mud on the tops and 
sides of their houses. But neither the 
North Wind nor Jack Frost came to the 
little Pond. Only a hot South Wind 
came that made the plastered roofs of the 
lodges so dry that several long cracks 



THE FOREST FIRE 


117 


split each one of them, and the hot wind 
blew the dried mud into dust and scat¬ 
tered it over the Pond until the poor 
Pond looked as if it had a dirty face. 

Father Beaver and all the other old 
beavers came out in the daylight and 
swam about, trying to find out just what 
the trouble was. But no one knew. 
Grandfather Bull-frog came out and sat 
on a log and stared solemnly at the hot 
sky that looked like a big, copper bowl. 
Then Grandfather Frog said “ Iver- 
chung!” very solemnly and slipped back 
into the pool, and just in time, too, for a 
big crane, that had recently come to the 
Pond, just missed him by a croak. 

The crane was not the only newcomer 
to the little Pond. A pair of bald eagles 
had suddenly appeared in the tall, dead 
spruce, and it seemed as if all the deer 
from the mountain had come down into 
the lowlands near the Ponds. Something 



118 THE BUSY BEAVERS OF ROUND-TOP 


surely was wrong. The rabbits began to 
appear in the deep grass in the open 
places where the beavers had cut the 
trees, and many foxes were to be seen 
along the foot of the Hill as the lack of 
water on the mountain drove them down 
to the Pond. 

And still Jack Frost did not come, and 
the plastered roofs baked harder and 
harder until the least puff of wind would 
blow off a cloud of dust. Every night, 
the beavers replastered their lodges, hop¬ 
ing and hoping that Jack would come. 
If he didn’t and the rains came instead, 
then the water would wash the mud away 
as fast as they could put it on, and then 
it would be a verv easv matter for the 
bears and wolves to pull their houses 
apart and catch the little beaver-folk. 
Oh, if only Jack would come! But he 
was nowhere to be seen and all that the 
beavers could do was to keep putting on 



THE FOREST FIRE 119 

fresh coats of plastered mud until the 
outside of each lodge was a large, smooth 
dome. 

And it was well, oh, very well for the 
beavers that they kept their lodges this 
way without a twig or a branch showing. 
For one day. Father Beaver put his nose 
up out of the Pond and took a long, long 
sniff. And the bald eagles uttered fierce, 
wild cries, and the rabbits and the foxes 
and the bears and woodchucks and porcu¬ 
pines fled wildly away from the moun¬ 
tain, for the wind had brought news of 
the worst enemy that Mother Nature 
ever turns against the forest-people,— 
fire! 

Over the near-by hills and mountains it 
swept, across the valley, until it reached 
Long Pond and the Beaver-Pond. 
Choking clouds of smoke, bits of burning 
grasses and leaves and burning, biting 
heat swept over the Ponds until the 



120 THE BUSY BEAVERS OF ROUND-TOP 


waters themselves grew hot and the out¬ 
side of the little lodges cracked and split 
in the heat! 

Some of the lodges and roofs cracked 
so that much smoke got into the living- 
rooms, and the poor beavers fled into the 
Pond to try to find some place where this 
terrible enemy could not creep in and 
find them. If only they could have 
stayed in the Pond far down under the 
water all the time,—but they would have 
drowned! And many, many of the 
smaller beavers did die from the smoke 
and the too-long swims in the water, for 
they found house after house either filled 
with smoke or crowded to the very doors 
with frightened little beavers! All the 
burrows were filled with smoke and it was 
a terrible time! Hundreds of little for¬ 
est-people threw themselves into the 
Ponds to escape the terrible heat and 
smoke and were saved by the waters. 



THE FOREST FIRE 


121 


Old Round-Top could not be seen be¬ 
cause of the clouds of smoke that swept 

over it from the valley below and the 

* 

burning mountains on either side of it, 
and it looked as if all the lovely trees on 
the dear, old Hill would be burned, too. 
But the rocky sides and crest gave the 
flames little chance to start there, and the 
Ponds at its foot stood like soldiers to 
drive the flames back. 

Again and again they swept over the 
Ponds almost to the Hill. Again and 
again, the grass flamed and blazed right 
to the hillside, only to die out against one 
or another of the big rocks that guarded 
it. 

The pines and hemlocks, with their 
needles so ready to burn, swayed and 
moaned as the heat waves passed over 
them in scorching blasts. But they did 
not take fire and when another morning 
dawned, the enemy had passed on over 



122 THE BUSY BEAVERS OF ROUND-TOP 


the Ridge and down the other side. The 
face of Round-Top had been saved, 
thanks to the Ponds and the rocks; and 
the many little homes along its sides, al¬ 
though deserted, were not destroyed. 

As the sun struggled through the mists 
and smoke, what a sight met his eyes! 
The faces of the Ponds were covered 
with burned twigs and branches and 
leaves! Most of the little woodland was 
burned black, and the lodges in Beaver- 
Town,—oh, what a sight they were! 
Cracked and split by the heat, their roofs 
black from the smoke, many were in 
ruins, and many beavers of the little town 
had been killed! 

Father Beaver’s house was packed to 
the doors with little beavers who had been 
so frightened by the roaring of the flames 
and the dense, black smoke, that if it had 
not been for Father Beaver’s well-built 
house, which didn’t let more than a faint 



THE FOBEST FIEE 


123 


smell of smoke creep in, they would all 
have been killed. As soon as the smoke 
and flames had gone, all of the beavers, 
big and little, left the houses and went for 
a swim. Oh, but it was good to breathe 
the sweet, fresh air once more! Surely, 
nothing, nothing could be better than just 
plenty of pure, fresh air! 

And then they all looked to see what 
damage had been done! Many of the lit¬ 
tle lodges had been cracked up and down 
and crossways. If they had not been 
plastered so very thickly, if any logs or 
branches had been sticking out for the 
flames to catch hold of, the poor little 
houses would have burned and their lit¬ 
tle owners as well. Those closest to the 
woodlands had gone and the beavers felt 
very badly about them! But there was 
still a great deal to be thankful for! It 
was bad enough, but it could have been 
worse! 



124 THE BUSY BEAVERS OF ROUND-TOP 


The entire little town set to work at 
once to repair the damage and replaster 
their lodges. And as they worked, the 
sky grew gray and cold, and that night 
the North Wind came howling over the 
mountain and Jack Frost came with it; 
and every night he froze the plaster as 
hard as a stone, harder than he had ever 
frozen it before. And he put a thicker 
ice-roof all over the Pond than it had 
ever known, and he tucked the beavers in 
so securely and snugly that not an enemy 
found them all winter! Jack Frost felt 
very sorry, no doubt, for having stayed 
away so long, and he was trying to make 
up as well as he knew how for his faults. 

When the ice melted and the March 
winds and warm rains brought spring 
back once more, she quickly covered up 
all the signs of the fire! Flowers and 
ferns and grasses and small bushes grew 
as they never had before, until every 



THE FOREST FIRE 


125 


blackened stump and burned, fallen tree 
was hidden. 

And now there were many new houses 
to be built in the town, for Big Brother 
and Little Brother and Big Sister and 
Little Sister and all the boy and girl 
beavers that had been born in the village 
the same year that they had been, were 
grown up, now, and ready to start homes 
of their own. Such a hurrying and scur¬ 
rying around for islands and desirable 
building places as there was! If the 
Pond had not been forced out until it was 
almost as wide as the old Hill itself, there 
surely would not have been islands and 
marshy spots enough to go around! 

But, finally, all the young pairs of 
beavers had managed to find very desir¬ 
able spots to build; and, to Bobby Lynx, 
now a full-grown wildcat, gazing down 
on the Pond from the limb of a big beech 
on the hill on which he liked to lie, the old 




126 THE BUSY BEAVERS OF ROUND-TOP 


marsh looked as if it were dotted with 
hundreds of huge beehives! Father and 
Mother Beaver had surely built a won¬ 
derful Beaver-Town. 

And there it is to this day. 


THE END 



J 


The following: pages contain questions 
with space for the answers to be written 

by 


The owner of this book* 


127 



r 




WHY DO BEAVERS ALWAYS BEGIN A 
NEW TOWN NEAR A STREAM t 


WHAT DID MOTHER AND FATHER 


BEAVER LOOK LIKE? 

























TELL HOW THE BEAVERS’ TAILS DIF¬ 
FER FROM THOSE OF OTHER ANI¬ 
MALS AND HOW THEY ARE USEFUL. 


HOW DO THE BEAVERS BUILD THEIR 
DAMS? 
























WHAT KIND OF HOMES DO BEAVERS 
HAVE? 


HOW DOES JACK FROST HELP BUILD A 


BEAVEB’S LODGE? 




















WHERE 18 THE FRONT DOOR OF A 
BEAVER’S HOUSE 1 


WHAT DO BEAVERS EATt 
















HOW DO THEY CUT DOWN TREES? 


WHERE DO THEY GET THEIR FOOD IN 


WINTER f 
















i 

r 



/ 





























































































































































